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<keyword id="6369763" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Vishal-Sikka">Vishal Sikka</keyword>, the CEO of Indian tech giant, has something to say on the company's shockingly lower performance in the June quarter, which led to a quake in the stock markets on Friday. As per Sikka, the performance was not a result of his strategy to move Infy away from its focus on lowering costs for clients to developing innovative solutions for them; rather, it was the result of an execution failure in certain segments of the business. 
 
As per Sikka, he has begun taking steps to fix those failures. 
 
When asked about his failure in providing appropriate revenue guidance in April, Sikka said that one of the big areas which still needed to be addressed was to improve internal processes and make Infosys a real-time company, "including our ability to forecast." 
 
The humble performance in the June quarter had forced the company to mark down its revenue guidance for the full year from April’s 11.5-13.5% to 10.5-12%. In the stock market, Rs 23,000 crore of investor wealth was wiped out in a single day as a reaction to the modest performance from Infosys. 
 
Sikka told TOI that there is a structural threat over the traditional way of delivering services, and it is facing tremendous pricing pressure. He also cited the pricing pressure to two major developments; one of them is that the clients are under tremendous cost pressure, while second could be the significant growth in their ability to set up captive centres. 
 
Because of several leading global companies establishing their own technology centres in India, outsourcing volumes have taken a significant beating. 
 
"The wrong response to this, as I have been saying, is a downward spiral -- use cheaper and cheaper people and jam them more into projects faster and faster. That journey ends at one place -- at zero. The right response is to transform towards innovation. We need to take projects and services where software and automation that we deliver improves the productivity of the people and frees up people to deliver innovation. If we are not able to do such a transition, the industry will go down," Sikka said, while exclusively interacting with TOI after Q1 results were announced. 
 
Sikka also said that he has noted several trends that point to his strategy emerging as a success. For example, more than one-third of the revenue growth of $55 million in Q1 came from automation and innovation, new services of the company. 
 
He added that Skava, a platform for mobile websites, apps and other digital shopping experiences for large retail customers, and the Edge series of innovative cloud-based software applications for enterprises, both did well. 
 
Talking of issues, he said that the company ran into problems when it came to "small areas -consulting, package implementations, decline in India business and Finacle (banking product) and a flat BPO". 
 
"Because it's the first quarter and it has disproportionate effect on the overall year's performance, it has brought down the guidance. It has not changed the fact that our strategy is working," Sikka added. 
 
<a href="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/W3xLfHGuWn4/maxresdefault.jpg">Image source</a>

Shocking Q1 performance a result of execution failure, says Infosys CEO Vishal Sikka

Earlier during the day, we told you how <keyword id="6354512" type="CITY" weightage="100" keywordseo="Infosys">Infosys</keyword> is slowly yet steadily moving on a progressive path. And now, we have heard another big news about the software firm. It has acquired <keyword id="35621" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="e-commerce">e-commerce</keyword> services provider <keyword id="2822352" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="Skava">Skava</keyword> for $120 million. This is the second largest acquisition from Infosys this year; earlier the company had bought Israel-based automation solutions startup <keyword id="2728667" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Panaya">Panaya</keyword> for $ 200 million. 
 
In a statement posted on their website, Infosys said it completed the acquisition of Kallidus Inc, which is the holding group behind Skava, and its affiliate on Thursday. 
 
"The acquisition is in accordance with the terms set out in the agreement announced on April 24, 2015. The acquisition of Skava is part of Infosys' strategy to help clients bring new digital experiences to their customers through IP-led technology offerings, new automation tools and unparalleled skill and expertise in these new emerging areas," Infosys said on its website. 
 Infosys chief <keyword id="6369763" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Vishal-Sikka">Vishal Sikka</keyword> has outlined plans and even formed a committee to aggressively pursue acquisitions as part of his vision to make Infosys a $20-billion company by 2020. Sikka wants acquisitions to generate at least $1.5 billion of annual revenue, as part of the strategy. And it seems, the company is headed in the right direction. 
 
(image credits: infotechlead.com)

Infosys has made its second largest acquisition of the year

India's second largest software exporter <keyword id="6354512" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Infosys">Infosys</keyword> would aim to return to industry-level growth rates by financial year 2017, if it manages to reach 10-12% <keyword id="6492838" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="revenue-growth">revenue growth</keyword> forecast this year, said the company’s chief financial officer <keyword id="347003" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Rajiv-Bansal">Rajiv Bansal</keyword>. 

	While attending an investor meet in Bengaluru on Thursday, Bansal said, the company would touch industry-level growth rates if it puts up a good show this year as compared to last year, when it grew at a meager 5.6%. 
 “When Mr Murthy came back (in 2013), we clearly said that we would take 3 years to get back to <keyword id="2896835" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="industry-level-growth-rate">industry-level growth rate</keyword> -- and that will be FY17," said Bansal. 

	"If 5.6% goes upto 10-12%, then next year we should see industry-level growth rates....I think we're on the right trajectory -- once we reach that 10-12% mark, I think it will give us a lot of confidence to touch industry-level growth rates," he added.
 Recently, Infosys has created a special team looking specifically at mergers and acquisitions, said UB Pravin Rao, the chief operating officer of the Bengaluru-headquartered IT firm. In 2014, Infosys hired former SAP executive <keyword id="2558261" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="Ritika-Suri">Ritika Suri</keyword> to lead <keyword id="101447" type="EVENT" weightage="80" keywordseo="MA">M&amp;A</keyword> for the company. 

	Moreover, Infosys expects acquisitions can bring in additional revenues of about $1.5 billion as the IT services behemoth aims to achieve a goal of generating $20 billion by 2020.
 

	"We have created a separate team looking at it -- a corporate development team looking at M&amp;A," said Rao.
 Ever since Suri joined Infosys, the company has pulled off two large acquisitions -- in January, it bought over Israel-based automation technology startup <keyword id="2728667" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Panaya">Panaya</keyword> for $200 million, while in April, Infosys acquired eCommerce service provider <keyword id="2822352" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Skava">Skava</keyword> for $120 million. 

	Infosys would aim to keep margins in the 25-26% range for the near term, depending on currency fluctuations, said Bansal.

	 
	 
	(Image: Reuters)

Infosys sees industry-level growth in FY17, if it meets 10-12% revenue growth that is

<keyword id="2558261" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Ritika-Suri">Ritika Suri</keyword> stepped down as <keyword id="4777835" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="infosys-executive-vice-president">Infosys executive vice president</keyword>. She was one of the top-paid executives who joined <keyword id="6354512" type="CITY" weightage="100" keywordseo="Infosys">Infosys</keyword> CEO <keyword id="6369763" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Vishal-Sikka">Vishal Sikka</keyword>’s team. Suri, who was brought on board by Sikka from SAP, earned more than Rs 5.1 crore in gross salary in FY17. She was in charge of Infosys’ corporate development and merger &amp; acquisitions. Business paper Mint that reported Suri’s exit stated she helped set up the company's $500 million venture fund which has since written down about a third of the $45 million is has deployed. Also, Suri led the acquisition of Israeli automation company <keyword id="2728667" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Panaya">Panaya</keyword>, which was at the centre of a whistleblower letter and a later investigation. However, Infosys says it has been cleared by an independent investigation into alleged improprieties in its acquisition of Panaya and ecommerce platform Skava. (Image: Edgeverve)

Infosys sees top level exit, executive vice president quits

A few days back, Indian IT giant <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Infosys-relaunches-ESOP/articleshow/53225972.cms">Infosys </a>shocked the stock markets when it posted a weak performance in the first quarter of this fiscal. 
 
Even though the last few quarters saw the company impressing one and all with its <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Infosys-posts-13-4-rise-in-net-profit-misses-estimates/articleshow/53222425.cms">performance</a>, everyone was shocked when it lowered its full-year guidance from April’s 11.5-13.5% April to 10.5-12%. 
 As reported earlier, CEO <keyword id="6369763" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Vishal-Sikka">Vishal Sikka</keyword> has said that this poor performance was the result of an <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Infosys-CEO-says-low-performance-in-Q1-a-result-of-execution-failure/articleshow/53265955.cms">execution failure</a>, and he has started to take <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Disappointed-Vishal-Sikka-re-jigs-top-order-after-dismal-Q1-another-key-executive-quits/articleshow/53278154.cms">remedial actions</a> for the same. 
 Sikka has written a detailed e-mail to all <keyword id="6354512" type="CITY" weightage="100" keywordseo="Infosys">Infosys</keyword> <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Infosys-to-allow-employees-to-switch-job-profiles-using-an-internal-platform/articleshow/53005186.cms">employees</a>, announcing the changes and confessing that he himself was "disappointed" with the performance. 
 
Here's the letter (verbatim) that company's <a href="http://www.businessinsider.in/Infosys-Comfy-app/articleshow/52972236.cms">employees </a>received from Sikka. 
 
Friends, 
 
The first quarter of our new financial year was a revelation in many ways. I view the reaction by the markets and the media as a clear sign of the high standards our company is held to, the expectations we carry, even though everyone understands that a 90 day cycle means little on a long journey. I am disappointed. Disappointed that our revenue performance was not what we could have delivered, but even more so, that this overshadowed the many strong strides we made on executing our strategy. 
 
Our revenue growth of 2.2% to $2501M, included a shortfall in consulting revenue, some declines in package implementations, and small declines in our India business and Finacle. But at the same time, we made great progress in both, renewing our core, AND in the new areas of our business, as well as in our culture of enabling this continual renew-new improvement. Our core business, delivery, under Ravi's great leadership, grew by 3.4%, improved its utilization, lowered its dependence on subcontractors, delivered ever higher benefits from automation, and derived tangible gains from both Zero Distance and Zero Bench. 
 
Equally importantly, if not even more so, our New business grew extremely well, under Sandeep's stewardship. Gains in our newly introduced Mana, as well as in Skava, EDGE, design services and other new areas, accounted for more than a fifth of our growth! On Mohit's watch, large deal wins crossed the $800M mark in TCV, our top 5, top 10 and top 25 clients, all grew faster than the company, the number of our $100M clients grew by 3 to 17, and we added 95 new clients. 
 
Ranga and his amazing finance team, helped improve the overall health of our company's profitability and financials. We are close to 100k Infoscions having been exposed to design-thinking, the number of ZD ideas crossed 11k, and more than 5k of these have been discussed with clients, and the first ones already monetized, thanks to a simple new process Ravi and Ranga have enabled, and ZB now has more than 20k jobs, and, in a year since its launch, this initiative got us to the point that more than 99.5% of the bench colleagues have been engaged, thus helping them deliver value and break the cycle of being on the bench not helping them gthe experience they need to get off the bench. And there were many others. 
 
Reflecting on this on my trip back home, mainly I learnt this: those areas which receive "the flame of our attention" in Jiddu Krishnamurti's words, show progress. And when running an operation as large and complex as ours, we must attend to each cog, every piece of our spectrum, to prevent a few negatives from overshadowing the many great positives. We cannot take our eyes off any important aspect of our business, each area of our large and diverse portfolio of services, products and platforms. In Q2, and beyond, we must accelerate our work in all the key strategic aspects of our work, AND we must address the weaknesses of Q1. 
 
Our stock incentive rewards program, back after 13 years, is a great celebration of our people, our potential, and our commitment to recognize performance, and to have us participate in our collective work, and its outcomes, for Infosys is no more and no less than us, each one of us, and all of us. To help us lead from the front, Pravin and I are making some changes to the team. In Consulting, we had already announced that Rajesh Murthy would take over going forward. 
 
Reporting to Rajesh, Michael Pesch will continue to run Europe, LATAM and APAC, and Kenneth Toombs, who recently joined Infosys, will run North America and India. Sanjay Purohit will join Pravin to work on strategic initiatives in bringing Design Thinking to our clients at scale. Ritika Suri will take over our large deals work, including SGS, from Anup Uppadhayay. Anup has decided to leave Infosys, and I would like to thank him for his tremendous loyalty and service to Infosys over the last 23 years. I have been privileged to work with Anup since I started my journey almost two years ago, and we wish him all the best. 
 
Ritika brings a strong background in sales, particularly in driving large deals for products and platforms, and this is exactly the kind of experience we need to help transform our large client engagements with a focus in our renew-new strategy. M&amp;A will move to Deepak Padaki, while Ritika continues to lead the Innovation Fund and our work with startups. She will continue to report to Ranga and Mohit will continue to sponsor our large deals work. In CIS, we will focus on renewing the existing business and bringing Mana to every aspect of it. 
 
This will be led by Narry (Narsimha Rao) who will take over from Samson David. Narry has been with Infosys for 15 years, and has been running IVS for the last 1.3 years with great success and excellence. Narry and the entire delivery team under Ravi's leadership, will work closely with Navin Budhiraja on the Mana platform. I am very happy that Sudhir Jha has joined us from Google to help with product management and product marketing for Mana and for bringing a product discipline to all our work. 
 
We thank Sam for his great work in growing the infrastructure business over the last few quarters, and his great contributions to Infosys for more than two decades, and wish him the best of luck in his future endeavors. Our success will be the result of our endeavor. The work of our people. The amazing individuals I meet every single day. I learnt that a million folks wanted to join the Infosys family last year! Our people focus will continue, and will be at the core of all that we do. 
 
My belief in each one of us was redoubled last week, when I spoke to a few PMs at Bangalore. One Infoscion from Chandigarh, with her zeal and her team's proactive ZD ideas for banking, represented the vision of unleashing the innovator within each of us, more than any words can express. But it will take the very best of the very best in us. At a time when the world around us seems ever more influenced by the baser instincts and tendencies, we must bring the best of our intentions, and the best of our imagination, our knowledge and our conviction, to all that we do. 
 
When Krishnamurti spoke of the flame of attention, he spoke of a compassionate attention, to what matters, to the long-term, purposeful, vision, to a fun, rewarding journey along the way. Over the weekend, a friend of mine wrote to me, asking me to "stay healthy, stay in the moment, focused on your actions, even as you work hard to let your achievements outshine your aspirations...". 
 
Here's to a strong Q2, and a strong remainder of the year, one that not only exceeds the high standards we are held to, but does so purposefully, in moving forward on the long haul, one that shows what we as Infoscions are capable of. Here's to our actions, our flames of attention, outshining our aspirations and others' expectations. 
 
Let's do it! 
 
Best, V 
 
<a href="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/idGDFItGn7o/maxresdefault.jpg">Image source</a>

Here’s the letter Vishal Sikka wrote to Infosys employees after disappointing Q1 performance

<keyword id="6354512" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Infosys">Infosys</keyword> CEO <keyword id="6369763" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Vishal-Sikka">Vishal Sikka</keyword> has asked employees not to get distracted by speculations that question the company's commitment. There have been reports of tension between Infosys founders and its management. He asked them to keep a "sharp focus" on executing the company's strategy, which is bolstered by its services like Mana, Skava, Edge, Panaya and cloud services. "...let us keep a sharp focus on the execution of our strategy. Let us not get distracted by media speculation that is designed to stir up gossip or rehash old rumours or speculate on the unknowns, around visas, or anything that questions our commitment to governance, integrity and values, in order to generate headlines and create, in the words of The Wire, Eardrum Buzz," <keyword id="281963" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Sikka">Sikka</keyword> said in an internal mail. "There is no second ¬guessing our deep commitment, passion and dedication to transforming this great company, even within the unprecedented new context that we find ourselves in. We are doing this. We will do this. Together!," he said. 
 
There have been reports of simmering differences between the CEO and its founders over issues like pay hike given to Sikka and severance package of two former senior executives. Infosys has, however, defended itself saying all decisions were made "in the overall interest of the company" and that it has made "full disclosures" on all developments. Infosys founders, along with their family members, owned 12.75 per cent in the company at the end of December 2016, as per the data available on the BSE. The buzz grew louder when Infosys' former chief financial officer TV Mohandas Pai said the board should give a detailed answer and not take shelter under "bland" statement that decisions were taken in the interest of the company. Sikka said Infosys' revenue growth, which previously under performed the industry growth by 50 per cent about 2 years ago, is now in line with overall industry growth. "...we have held margins through operational efficiency improvements and automation benefits. Our cash flow generation continues to be amongst the strongest in the industry. And in a key sign of a thriving enterprise, our new software and services have seen tremendous growth," he told employees. 
 
Infosys' strategy is focussed on delivering higher value services and bringing the latest advances in technology into work. "...we create unprecedented value for clients, employees, shareholders, and the larger global ecosystem in which we operate ¬¬ including delivering value as one of the largest and most respected companies in India," he said.

Vishal Sikka to employees: Don't be distracted by gossip about Infosys

IT major Infosys has instrumented a new plan to beat Trump's propaganda, according to news agency PTI. Infosys has been in favour of a healthy mix of local and global personnel even though hiring locals in overseas markets often pushes up operational costs for IT outsourcing companies. With the US mulling over various measures to make visa norms stricter under the <keyword id="6354484" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Donald-Trump">Donald Trump</keyword> administration, Indian IT firms have been contemplating tweaking their business models and accommodating more locals. "We are closely monitoring the overall situation with respect to visa... in the last 24 months, we have focused on increasing our presence in the US with a lot more local hiring," Infosys Chief Operating Officer U B Pravin Rao told investors on a recent conference call. He added that at this stage, Infosys has not seen any "undue things" that will impact the way it does business. "In this year, we will continue that focus. We will accelerate it. We will also start looking at developments and training centres in the US as well," he said. Rao, however, did not talk about the investments Infosys will make on the expansion. The North American markaccounted for over 60 per cent of Infosys' USD 10.2 billion revenue in the 2016-17 fiscal. During his election campaign, US President Trump had promised stricter immigration laws and protection of local jobs. Besides, a legislation (Lofgren Bill) in the US was introduced that proposed doubling of the minimum wages of H-1B visa holders to USD 130,000. Most recently, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) had come out with a policy memorandum that potentially makes it difficult for Indian technology professionals to work in the US at entry-level positions. Any change in visa norms can affect the movement of labour as well as spike operational costs for the IT players. Indian firms like <keyword id="6357150" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="TCS">TCS</keyword>, Infosys and <keyword id="10862" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Wipro">Wipro</keyword> that are dependent on visas are now focusing on bringing on board more locals to comply with the norms. Once considered an industry bellwether, Infosys has had its share of challenges over the past few years. Apart from competition from rivals like TCS and <keyword id="28721" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Cognizant">Cognizant</keyword>, it is also facing a public spat between founders and the Board over allegations of corporate governance lapses. Under CEO Vishal Sikka, the company has been trying to turn things around. The former <keyword id="6358384" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="SAP">SAP</keyword> executive has set up an ambitious target for Infosys reaching USD 20 billion revenue by 2020 with a strong focus on new technologies like automation and artificial intelligence. While Sikka himself has admitted that the goal is "aspirational", the company has continued to invest in start-ups working on these new-generation technologies. "...our FY17 revenues from new software and software- related services including Mana, Panaya, Skava and Edge grew at more than 42 per cent," Sikka said. He added that the company will report revenues on a quarterly basis from the new software and offerings such as digital, Internet of Things and cybersecurity from this fiscal onwards. The new services are also helping the company generate over USD 125,000 per year in revenue per employee.

Bad day for brain drain in India: Infosys to hire local talents in USA

India’s second largest software exporter <keyword id="6354512" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Infosys">Infosys</keyword> expects acquisitions can bring in additional revenues of about $1.5 billion as the IT services behemoth aims to achieve a goal of generating $20 billion by 2020. The company is also aiming to bring attrition levels down to the lowest in the industry in the same time frame. 
 

	These targets include increasing revenue per Full Time Equivalent to $80,000 by deploying automation and innovation in existing businesses and inorganic investment strategies influencing approximately $1.5 billion of new revenue, according to PTI. "The mission of our management is to prepare the company to achieve an aspirational goal of $20 billion in revenue by calendar year 2020 with at least 30% operating margin with specific targets," Infosys CEO <keyword id="6369763" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Vishal-Sikka">Vishal Sikka</keyword> said in the company's annual report. The IT firm has already acquired some companies in the past few months. It announced its first major acquisition in February under Sikka, who had taken over as CEO in August 2014, of New Jersey-based automation technology firm <keyword id="2728667" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Panaya">Panaya</keyword> for $200 million. In April, Infosys made another large acquisition and bought <keyword id="2822310" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Kallidus">Kallidus</keyword> (also known as Skava) for $120 million. 
	 

	The Bengaluru-based company has been scouting for innovative companies in areas like automation and artificial intelligence. 

	The IT firm has already said it is open to 'bigger scale' mergers and acquisitions but with a caveat, it is not interested in "yesterdays" companies. 
	 

	Sikka said new services like design thinking, solutions in artificial intelligence and intellectual property-led businesses are expected to contribute at least 10% of Infosys' revenues. 
	 

	Infosys would also focus on building a vibrant ecosystem "from the ground up by investing in, incubating and growing innovative startups and companies that will help define the next generation of services and business models," he added. Once the bellwether of Indian <keyword id="6374576" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="IT-Industry">IT industry</keyword>, the company lagged behind its peers like <keyword id="6357585" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Tata-Consultancy-Services">Tata Consultancy Services</keyword> and <keyword id="30331" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="HCL-Technologies">HCL Technologies</keyword> in terms of growth. 
	 

	Moreover, it also faced a series of senior level exits that the company has now capped with a series of measures like promotions and increments. 
	 

	The target would also be "bringing attrition levels down to the lowest in the industry and achieving at least 25% in diversity in our top leadership", Sikka said. 
	 

	On standalone basis, the attrition rate for fiscal 2015 stood at 18.9% compared with 18.7% in the previous fiscal. 
	 

	Infosys has over 1.76 lakh employees with the addition of 15,782 (net) people. Sikka also expressed confidence that the company can grow at 10-12% rate in the ongoing fiscal. 

	 
	(Image: Reuters)

Infosys is going to make an additional $1.5 billion in revenues via acquisitions

India’s second largest software exporter Infosys has formed a special investment committee on its board to keep a watch on all new acquisitions and big investments of the company. <keyword id="6369763" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Vishal-Sikka">Vishal Sikka</keyword>, the CEO of the Bengaluru-headquartered IT MNC, is aggressively pursuing buyouts as the company wants to generate $20 billion of revenue by 2020. 
 Its rivals, both <keyword id="10862" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Wipro">Wipro</keyword> and <keyword id="6357585" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Tata-Consultancy-Services">Tata Consultancy Services</keyword> (TCS), have a special committee to oversee decisions regarding strategy planning, capital expenditure programmes, acquisitions and investments. Roopa Kudva, new board member and managing director of <keyword id="211875" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="80" keywordseo="Omidyar-Network">Omidyar Network</keyword>'s India operations, would chair the committee that comprises board veteran and former <keyword id="28250" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Microsoft-India">Microsoft India</keyword> chairman <keyword id="50299" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Ravi-Venkatesan">Ravi Venkatesan</keyword> among other board members, two people familiar with the development told the Economic Times. 
	 

	"Infosys felt that creating a committee to oversee acquisitions was a necessity, given the company's more aggressive stance on acquisitions and investments under Sikka — this committee will be responsible for vetting and overseeing all decisions the company makes on acquisitions, along with the approval of the rest of the board," said one of them. 
	 

	Infosys declined to confirm whether such a committee had been formed. "We do not comment on rumours or speculation," a company spokeswoman said in an email response to ET. 
 

	Sikka has said that he wants acquisitions to generate at least $1.5 billion of that. According to the company's quarterly report, Infosys had cash and cash equivalents of about $5.2 billion as of March 31, 2015. Earlier, in an interview to ET, Sikka said that Infosys would be very aggressive in chasing buyouts. In February, days after the software company bought automation startup <keyword id="2728667" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Panaya">Panaya</keyword> for about Rs 1,200 crore ($200 million), the first non-founder CEO of Infosys said, "We have a dozen targets we are looking at now." Infosys made another large acquisition and bought ecommerce services provider <keyword id="2822310" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="80" keywordseo="Kallidus">Kallidus</keyword> (also known as Skava) for $120 million in April. "Anytime we see a company with talent, capabilities and IP in these areas (AI and collaboration technology) we would love to go for an acquisition," said Sikka, a former SAP board member. 
	 

	Both the Panaya and Skava acquisitions were vetted by the newly-formed investment committee on the Infosys board, said the two sources quoted above. 
	 

	The formation of this committee comes at a crucial juncture for Infosys, which is making big bets in newer areas of technology as part of Sikka's overall plan to turnaround the fortunes of the company and also when rivals such as TCS and Wipro are trying to make similar investments to gain a first-mover advantage in areas such as artificial intelligence and automation. Sandra Notardonato of <keyword id="6371981" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Gartner">Gartner</keyword> Research said, to achieve the compound annual rate of revenue growth of 18% implied by the $20 billion target, Infosys is counting on $1.5 billion in acquisitions, 10% contribution from new service areas and 15% internal growth. It’s worth noting that Infosys’ rival Wipro also has a committee that oversees decisions around acquisitions, among other things. Wipro's billionaire chairman <keyword id="6419840" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Azim-Premji">Azim Premji</keyword>, CEO TK Kurien, board veterans <keyword id="2881183" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="William-Arthur-Owens">William Arthur Owens</keyword> and Jagdish Sheth, and former head of <keyword id="6528042" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Hewlett-Packard">Hewlett-Packard</keyword>'s printing business Vyomesh Joshi are currently part of this committee. Even Tata Consultancy Services has an executive committee that oversees decisions around capital expenditure programmes, acquisitions and investments. Members of the committee include TCS CEO N Chandrasekaran, <keyword id="6355725" type="CITY" weightage="80" keywordseo="Tata-Group">Tata Group</keyword> chairman <keyword id="6356895" type="PERSON" weightage="80" keywordseo="Cyrus-Mistry">Cyrus Mistry</keyword>, former company veteran S Ramadorai, Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen and board veteran Ron Sommer. 
	 
	(Image: Indiatimes)

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Shocking Q1 performance a result of execution failure, says Infosys CEO Vishal Sikka

BI India Bureau

Infosys has made its second largest acquisition of the year

BI India Bureau

Infosys sees industry-level growth in FY17, if it meets 10-12% revenue growth that is

BI India Bureau

Infosys sees top level exit, executive vice president quits

BI India Bureau

Here’s the letter Vishal Sikka wrote to Infosys employees after disappointing Q1 performance

BI India Bureau

Vishal Sikka to employees: Don't be distracted by gossip about Infosys

BI India Bureau

Bad day for brain drain in India: Infosys to hire local talents in USA

BI India Bureau

Infosys is going to make an additional $1.5 billion in revenues via acquisitions

BI India Bureau

Infosys CEO Vishal Sikka creates a special panel to look into all acquisitions

BI India Bureau

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